An often-acquisitive Oracle (ORCL) is offering $663 million to buy Textura (TXTR), a maker of cloud software for managing construction contracts and projects.
The all-cash deal, worth $26 per share, should close before the end of 2016 provided that more than two-thirds of Textura stockholders tender their shares and the union meets regulatory approvals.
The move expands the software giant’s extensive—and growing—portfolio of industry-focused software applications. The construction industry is massive with annual spending projected to hit $17 trillion by 2030. Up to 10% of that amount is wasted on inefficient processes.
That’s where Oracle and Textura come in.
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Textura generated slightly less than $25 million for its first quarter, which it reported on Thursday, losing $1.5 million during the three-month period. Its cloud software processes more than $3.4 billion in payments for general contractors, engineers, and subcontractors each month, currently accommodating more than 6,000 different projects. It handles everything from compliance documentation to invoice automation and electronic approvals.
For example, pharma company Eli Lilly used Textura’s software to manage construction of a $400 million manufacturing—cutting roughly two months off the timeline and saving $4.3 million by catching quality issues earlier in the process.
Other Textura customers include the $9.3 billion supermarket chain Hy-Vee, as well as some of the larger U.S. Construction companies, such as PCL Construction and Clark Construction.
Textura’s customers pay for its services based on project activity, rather than on a monthly consumption model as is the case for many software applications delivered as cloud services.
After the acquisition is complete, the company’s software will be sold in collaboration with Oracle’s Primavera project management applications as part of the Oracle Engineering and Construction Global Business Unit.
Many cloud upstarts are choosing to specialize in a single industry, which cloud trigger a consolidation wave as software giants such as Oracle, Microsoft, and Salesforce build out their portfolios. Oracle invests more than $700 million annually in research and development for industry-focused software applications.
But this is by no means Oracle’s biggest industry-specific acquisition. Two years ago, Oracle paid $5.3 billion to buy Micros, which sells systems for hotels and retailers.
